Moonlight Lover (41 page)

But he could well imagine. He remembered talk of a foolish young daughter who had tried to elope with the son of the captain of the guard. A Protestant. She was not heard from again. But on cold, winter nights, the servants swore that her voice was heard, calling for mercy. He thought he could hear her singing now.

A chill slivered down his spine.

Rachel stopped singing and held her breath. Was it her imagination? Had she conjured Sin-Jin up so often, she could now hear his voice? But it was plain, she could swear that she had heard it plain.

Stumbling to the door she discovered sometime early in her eternal confinement, she wrapped bloodied fingers around the bars set in the small opening that ancient jailers had used to view their prisoners.

"Sin-Jin?" Rachel's voice swelled as hope, panic and frail nerves broke. "Sin-Jin, are you out there?"

"Oh, my God!" Unable to believe he had finally found her, that she had been thrust here in this nether world, Sin-Jin ran the rest of the way to the cell. Their fingers entwined over one another through the bars. "Rachel, are you all right?"

Her knees threatened to buckle again. She wanted to laugh, cry, everything at once. "No, I am not all right!" Her parched throat croaked out the words. "Now stop asking foolish questions and get me out of here!'

The sob that threatened to emerge was swallowed as hope flushed through her like a moonbeam streaking across the surface of a lake. When she had seen the distant light of the torch, she had thought her jailer was finally coming for her. She feared the confrontation, but anything was better than remaining trapped in this enclosure with nothing but vermin for company.

She yanked at the bars, though she had tried them countless times before. Her frustration to be free nearly exploded within her.

"Please, Sin-Jin," she cried.

The sound of her pleading undid him. Sin-Jin pulled at the door, but it remained fast. He clenched his hands in impotent anger, looking around for something to batter the door open with.

"Here try this." When Sin-Jin turned, Duncan handed him a rusted key on a corroded ring.

Sin-Jin stared at it dumbly for a moment. He hadn't expected it to be this easy, not when everything else had been so difficult.

"Where the hell did you get this?" he demanded incredulously.

"Talk about looking a gift horse in the mouth," Duncan said with a shake of his head. He pointed to the wall on the other side of the cells. A huge nail protruded from the wall. "It was hanging right there in plain sight." He shrugged. "I guess whoever put her here didn't think anyone was going to come strolling by to rescue her."

Rachel didn't recognize the other voice. She didn't care if St. Michael had come with all his archangels or Lucifer with his devils as long as the door to the cell opened. "Will the two of you stop having a discussion out there and get me out of here?"

Sin-Jin swiftly jammed the key into the lock and
turned it. After a moment, the lock gave and sprang open.
He pulled the door of the cell and Rachel fell into his arms.

Tears sprinkled liberally through her sooty lashes as she hit his shoulder with the flat of her hand. It was a weak blow at best. "What took you so long?" she cried with obvious relief.

Sin-Jin just held her to him as he wrestled with his emotions. A part of him had been afraid that he would never see her again. She clung to him like a child
emerging from a terrifying nightmare. He kissed her head
softly, the relief that flooded him temporarily draining him of the ability to speak.

"I stopped to ask directions," Sin-Jin finally answered. "Here." He fumbled at the water pouch that hung from his shoulder. He'd thought to bring it at the last moment, as if something had warned him that he'd have need of it. "Drink slowly," he cautioned.

It tasted better than the best ambrosia. After a moment, Rachel felt almost reborn. With a desire for vengeance stirring her blood.

Duncan stood off to the side, waiting for the scene to be played out. They deserved their privacy, he thought. But time was important. Discovery could come at any moment. They had to be prepared.

Duncan tapped Sin-Jin on the shoulder. "We take the same route out?" he suggested.

Sin-Jin's face hardened. "Take her to the horses, Duncan," he instructed, handing Rachel over. "I've a score to settle."

Though she was weak from hunger, strength seemed to
flow into her from an unknown source. Revenge was a powerful revitalizer and it coursed through her veins now with the force of a gale.

"The hell I'll stay with the horses." Both men looked at her in surprise.

Summoning every ounce of strength she had left, she raised her chin. "Your score is nothing compared with mine. Where am I?" she demanded although she thought she already knew the answer to that.

"Beneath Shallot," Sin-Jin told her.

Rachel's eyes glinted in the light from the torch. "I surmised as much. I think the fair Vanessa should avail herself of a wig maker. And quickly." For emphasis, Rachel grasped the air and yanked it to her. "Just point me in the right direction," she instructed Sin-Jin.

He wanted to send her away, but she had the right to confront the woman who had ordered her abduction and condemned her to die within the squalor of that cell.

Sin-Jin looked over Rachel's head and saw Duncan looking at him, waiting. This was entirely Sin-Jin's play.

"This way." Sin-Jin pointed forward.

The cave and its passageway ended beneath the library.
Sin-Jin crept up to the top of the stone stairway and listened against the wooden barrier. On the other side the entrance was rendered invisible by a section of a bookcase. He heard nothing. Taking a deep breath, he slowly pushed the bookcase open.

The room was empty.

Sin-Jin and Duncan drew their swords and then stepped out into the room. Rachel spied the fireplace. Stepping out between the men, she quickly seized a poker. Her hand curling over the hilt, she looked at Sin-Jin.

"I'm ready."

It occurred to Sin-Jin that Joan of Arc probably had the same look in her eyes riding into Orleans. But with luck, the ending would be written differently for them.

It was noon.

Vanessa sat alone in the huge dining hall. She liked her
own company and the stillness didn't bother her. It gave her time to reflect. And enjoy.

She smiled as she looked at the covered dishes on the table. There was a bountiful meal before her. It whetted her appetite to know that somewhere below her, while she partook of this feast, Rachel was slowly starving to death.

If the rats weren't getting rid of her first.

Vanessa laughed to herself as she spread the linen napkin on her lap. She hoped the rodents would make a good meal of her. It served the chit right, spoiling all her plans. She knew she could have had Rachel easily disposed of in France, but that would have been far too quick. She relished the thought that the girl would die slowly, torturously.

As well she should.

Vanessa raised the wine glass in a silent toast, then
brought the glass to her lips and slowly sipped. She could
wait. It was only a matter of time before Sin-Jin would change his mind.

And in the event that he didn't, he could be gotten around as well. She had money and power enough to see to that. That brute, Simeon, would be more than happy to squeeze the very life out of Sin-Jin's brawny, sensuous body. And then there'd be no more Lawrences left to get in her way.

She frowned as a movement reflected in her silver bowl caught her eye.

What—?

Her shriek was muffled by the hand that clamped over her mouth.

Chapter Forty-Two

Vanessa's eyes were huge as she saw Sin-Jin and another, taller man circle the table and stand in front of her. How had they gotten in without her knowledge? Why hadn't one of the servants warned her?

She tried to scream and the sound was pressed back into her mouth.

The hand covering her mouth was small, slender, dirty. A woman's hand. Vanessa bared her teeth, ready to take a bite out of the palm.

But just as Vanessa opened her mouth to strike, Rachel pulled her hand away. It came back with a fury as she hit the older woman across her cheek with the back of her hand. The force of the blow rattled Vanessa's head.

"Bitch!" Rachel spat.

Vanessa leaped to her feet, her chair clattering to the floor. She whirled to look at her bedraggled assailant and her mouth fell open in shock.

"Whore!" Vanessa screamed at her when she found her voice.

Duncan leaned toward Sin-Jin. He'd seen enough confrontations to know that a fight was going to follow. "I don't think she should have said that to Rachel."

Neither woman heard Duncan. Throwing the poker on the floor, Rachel lunged at Vanessa, screaming an oath that made the other woman blanch. Shrieking, nails protracted, the two women fell to the ground, grappling with one another like alley cats over a table scrap.

Sin-Jin-moved to break them apart, but Duncan laid a hand on his shoulder and stopped him. When Sin-Jin looked at him quizzically, Duncan shook his head.

"Let her get it out of her system. She's earned the right," he advised, nodding toward Rachel.

Or where Rachel had been a moment ago. Hands fisted
in Vanessa's hair, Vanessa's nails clawing at her clothes, Rachel rolled over and over again, first on top, then beneath the richly dressed woman.

Duncan crossed his arms before him, studying the combatants. "Are you a betting man?" he asked Sin-Jin mildly.

He saw the wisdom in Duncan's words, but couldn't help the momentary flash of concern. "Rachel," Sin-Jin
answered without hesitation, stepping back quickly to get
out of their way.

"Vanessa is the larger," Duncan pointed out. "She has the advantage of weight and size."

Sin-Jin laughed, his eyes never leaving the two. Obviously the man had never known a woman like Rachel. "Have you ever seen a game cock attack a dog?"

Duncan nodded. Already he could see that Vanessa was flagging. "Point well taken. I'm to lose, then?" The knowledge made him smile.

Vanessa crumpled in a heap on the floor, sobbing. Her dress was torn, her eye swollen and two of her teeth were loosened. Her lower lip was bleeding. Indeed there was blood all over her dress.

Sin-Jin glanced in Duncan's direction. "I'm afraid you just did." Sin-Jin put out his hand for payment.

Duncan merely nudged Sin-Jin's hand closed. When the other man raised a brow, he laughed heartily. "I set no terms to the wager."

Sin-Jin couldn't find it in himself to quarrel. Not when everything had turned out so well. Drawing Rachel against him, he hugged her.

"Feel better?" he asked.

"I feel wonderful." And she did. For exactly one minute.

And then Rachel sagged, exhausted beyond words, but still very much satisfied for the first time in several days.

"I need a bath." She raised her mouth to Sin-Jin's and accepted a sweet kiss. "And food." She eyed the meal on the table. "Lots and lots of food."

The bath came after the meal. A long, life-reaffirming bath in which she wasn't the only participant.

Refreshed, nourished and feeling human again, Rachel confronted her former captor in the front room where Duncan had remained, standing guard over Vanessa.

Vanessa sat, seething, in an ornately carved chair. She had tried her best to entice Duncan into releasing her. But the grinning ape had politely, infuriatingly refused. Even when she had offered him money, a great deal of money, and the added boon of making love to her, the fool had refused. He said that only one part of the offer
tempted him. He added that he doubted if she had enough
money in her possession to make him betray a friend.

When Sin-Jin and Rachel entered the room, Vanessa tensed. She had no idea what to expect at their hands.

She glared at the freshly groomed woman, acutely aware of her own bedraggled appearance.

"Why can't you afford me the same courtesy you give to her?" Vanessa demanded of Sin-Jin.

Sin-Jin draped his long frame in the chair opposite Vanessa and looked insolently at her. "I'm letting you live, woman. Content yourself with that, pitiful though that life is."

Vanessa read the meaning behind his words. "You're sending me away?" she shrieked.

She half rose in her chair, ready to spring. But Duncan pushed her down again, his hand firmly planted on her shoulder.

"You're getting better than you deserved," Sin-Jin pointed out.

He had discussed the problem at length with Rachel during what had ultimately transformed into an erotic soak in the tub for both of them. He was surprised to discover how generous her heart was. If the tables had been turned, Vanessa wouldn't have shown her any
kindness. She would have ordered Rachel's heart cut out.

Sin-Jin took Rachel's hand. "I'm sending you to your father in Northumberland. You're never to set foot on my manor or any of my lands again as long as you live."

"This is my land. Mine! You can't banish me!" Vanessa screamed incredulously. She had been mistress here. Shallot belonged to her more than to Sin-Jin. How dare he cast her off like this?

"Try returning and see what happens," he said
evenly. He loathed looking at Vanessa but forced himself.
He wanted her to see how much he despised her. "Perhaps in time, you'll find another titled fool to make miserable. Content yourself with the fact that I am not having you stand trial for Rachel's attempted murder." He had not the time nor the inclination to drag his brother's name through a scandalous trial, though if
there was a quick way to send her to the gallows, he would
have gladly done it. "I don't have the time to waste on you.”

He saw the flash in her eyes. Vanessa opened her
mouth and he guessed the nature of her words. There was venom in her eyes. Sin-Jin raised his hand, silencing her.

"Oppose me and I'll find the time to see you swing from the gallows."

She wished for a sword to run through his heart. "They won't believe you!"